Portable reading device for the blind

Abstract

A portable reading device for the blind consisting of a miniature housing (2) attached to a sleeve to be fitted over the tip of the user's index finger like a thimble. The housing (2) includes an optical sensor array (5) and an electromagnetic unit for displaying one printed character at a time in Braille on a tactile surface as soon as the user's finger passes over the character. The electromagnetic unit contains six electromagnets (7) for reproducing Braille characters, and two further electromagnets for indicating incorrect tracking to the user. The latter two electromagnets are activated when the blind user's finger moves too far up or down as it runs along a line of text.

What is claimed is: 
     
       1. A portable reading device for the blind including optical sensors capable of acquiring printed text, electronics with built-in software for printed character recognition and software for converting said printed characters into Braille characters, and a touch recognition surface, characterized in that the reading device comprises a miniature housing (2) attached to a sleeve to be fitted over the tip of the blind person's index finger like a thimble, said miniature housing (2) including an optical sensor array (5) provided with a lens (4), and an electromagnet unit (6) for displaying in Braille one character at a time, on a touch surface (32), as soon as the blind person's finger slides over a printed character and when said index finger is exactly located over said character; said electromagnetic unit (6) contains six electromagnets (7) for reproducing Braille characters and two further electromagnets (27) and (28) for indicating incorrect tracking to the reader; the latter two electromagnets being activated when the blind person moves his (her) finger too far up or down as it runs along a line of text. 
     
     
       2. A portable reading device for the blind according to claim 1 characterized in that an electronic box (3) has built-in software for identifying line spacing within a paragraph, or any blank area surrounding text, for stimulating the electromagnets (27) or (28) according to a predetermined code if the finger deviates when reading. 
     
     
       3. A portable reading device for the blind according to claim 1 characterized in that the characters from the lines located just above and below the line being processed are permanently acquired by the sensors (5), thus memorizing the beginning and the end of each line, in such a way that coded stimulation from electromagnets (27) and (28) indicates the end of the line and the accurate position of the next line to the blind person. 
     
     
       4. A portable reading device for the blind according to claim 1, characterized in that the activation of large dots representing the letters and made up of mobile cores (20) removes the small fixed dots made up of the rods (19). 
     
     
       5. A portable reading device for the blind according to claim 1, characterized in that each mobile core (20) is hollow and is crossed by the fixed rod (19). 
     
     
       6. A portable reading device for the blind according to claim 1, characterized in that a plurality of mobile rods (31) is implemented: each small dot being represented by the raising of one rod and each large dot being represented by the raising of several rods. 
     
     
       7. A portable reading device for the blind according to claim 1, characterized in that, when the blind person moves his (her) finger over an image, the optical sensors (5) can handle several contrast levels of the drawing outlines, in such a way that the electronics of the box (3) sends in real time the various levels of current intensity to the electromagnets (7) to get several levels of raised pattern formed by the rods (31) to transcribe a picture. 
     
     
       8. A portable reading device for the blind according to claim 1, characterized in that the right and left parts of the touch surface (32) are provided with bosses (29) and (29bis) on which a pressure causes, depending on its direction and intensity, the virtual scrolling of characters to be speed up, stopped or reversed. 
     
     
       9. A portable reading device for the blind according to claim 1, characterized in that the optical component (4) can read characters remotely by using an auto-focus system or the hyper-focal feature of a fixed lens. 
     
     
       10. A portable reading device for the blind according to claim 1, characterized in that a scanning of each field module by the optical sensor array (5) assigns to said module associated with one or several pixels, a predefined sound frequency corresponding to the dominant colour of said module. 
     
     
       11. A portable reading device for the blind according to claim 1, characterized in that skipping from a line to a new line or from an image to a new one during the scanning performed by the sensors (5) produces a specific sound signal or a very short silence, the duration of which is a few milliseconds for skipping to the next line and a few tens milliseconds for skipping to the next image. 
     
     
       12. A portable reading device for the blind according to claim 1, characterized in that the optical sensors (5) can detect infrared "light" and reproduce it though a specific sound frequency to notify the blind of the presence of human beings or animals. 
     
     
       13. A portable reading device for the blind according to claim 1, characterized in that the power of the acoustic signal matching the dominant colour associated with each cell (xnym), increases uniformly from the edges to both median axis (33) and (34) and decreases in the reverse direction. 
     
     
       14. A portable reading device for the blind according to claim 1, characterized in that an optical sensor array is located close to each eye, the sounds resulting from the signals analysed by the optical sensor array (5) placed over the right and the left eye being routed respectively to the right and the left ear, thus providing the blind with stereophonic perception. 
     
     
       15. A portable reading device for the blind according to claim 1, characterized in that a belt includes the rechargeable battery power supply for the electronic box (3) as well as a specific circuit (10) for charging said batteries by simply plugging the belt buckle rods into a mains socket.